


Waiting

by hotnthorny



Category: Star Wars - All Media Types, Star Wars: The Clone Wars (2008) - All Media Types
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-08-14
Updated: 2020-08-14
Packaged: 2021-03-06 02:59:42
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,171
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/25896331
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/hotnthorny/pseuds/hotnthorny
Summary: A busy night on Coruscant is hell, but a slow night is a hell of its own sort. Thorn just wants his shift to be over and his partner to come relieve him.
Kudos: 10





	Waiting

**Author's Note:**

> I'd like to than my good friend, Sans, for taking my writing and making it so much more beautiful. For being willing to go through and carefully reword and edit my 4 am grammatical errors to better tell the story. Thank you so much again!

The commander rocked on his heels, body swaying back and fourth as he stared blankly at the monitors before him. An arm was folded across his chest, the other bent up so his fingers could strum over the filters of his helmet in an erratic rhythm.

The caffeine coursing through his veins helped him to remain wide awake, but failed to liberate him from the ceaseless exhaustion he felt, especially on a night as quiet as then. It was a small miracle, really. Up till then, only a handful of felons were turned in, and he gave them each a couple dozen or so tickets. Hardly any action when compared to the usual night on Coruscant, but he couldn't complain, wouldn't complain. He got the easy shift, after all.

Didn't mean that it wasn't any less boring than watching paint dry.

Not that he'd ever say that aloud. He was a clone, after all; purposed to serve diligently and without question, without hesitance, and with the upmost efficiency. To many, he was just a tool of the republic a mindless, compliant being that followed orders and nothing more, but unfortunately for those who felt that way, it wasn't true. Though a clone he was, he was ever bit just as human. He shared the same genetic coding that made him just as human as the one he and his countless brothers were cloned from, he felt just as many feelings, and could think all the same. And at that moment, he felt bored. 

Five minutes hadn't even passed when Thorn checked the time again almost restlessly. Still bouncing on the balls of his feet, he awaited the end of his shift. Abruptly, his eyes snapped to one of the monitors at the movement from within the cell; one of the new arrestees had gotten up, and started to pace about the room, up and down.

It was the fifth time, the commander noted. The fifth time in the last hour he'd done so. Seems like I'm not the only one restless tonight. Ceaseing his rocking, Thorn glanced at the time; it'd only been two minutes since the last time he had. He gave a heavy sigh, and allowed himself to slouch momentarily, before he straightened up once more, and resumed his absent watch of the screens he had memorized by now. Forty-seven minutes till he would finally be able to clock out. Until then, all he had to do was to occupy himself. Just forty-seven more minutes of the hellishly never-ending expanse of time the night turned out to be.

Those forty-seven minutes came and went, and he was still standing there, watching the monitors which were only slightly more interesting than anything else he could be doing at the moment. He had trod along the expanse of the control room for a while and watched the minutes go by. Thorn was too worn out to put forth an effort to knock out the stack of paperwork left unattended, yet skittishly wired on the caff he'd drunk earlier. Subsequently, that led him to a jittery conflict; he wanted something to do, but at the same time, nothing.

At the sliding of the metal, he looked up from the monitors; the door opened, and his relief walked in. Finally, he heaved a brief sigh as he turned his head towards the newcomer. "There you are. Almost thought you'd never make it," his voice, despite sounding slightly rough from the lack of use in hours, held a joking tone, not actually meaning what he'd said.

"Really? And here I thought I'd gotten here," Stone, his fellow commander, shift relief, and most importantly: brother; looked down at his wrist dramatically, as if checking a watch for the time. They didn't wear watches. "Two minutes early," his tone was just as sarcastically joking, if not more enthusiastic.

"Your time must be off," Thorn rebutted, as he turned to face his brother. His grin, though hidden behind his bucket, warmed his voice, and with the slight tilt of his head, his brother would know he was messing with him. They all knew each other's body language by heart, all shared it. Even hidden behind the emotionless armor they had donned on, they knew how to read one another — somehow managed to be so much more expressive than one would think — from the tiniest movement.

"What've we got tonight?" Stone stood by Thorn's side, as he observed the monitors which had been under Thorn's scrutiny for the past several hours.

"Eh, not much. A couple dealers, a drunkie, and . . . of course, a pacer." A chuckle rumbled in his throat as he jerked a thumb back in the direction of the screen that held the most active prisoner of the night, who was back to pacing around his cell.

"A-ha," Stone mouthed. "Guess I've got my work cut out for me then, haven't I?" Stone chuckled at his own joke, shaking his head after as he recomposed himself. "Well, now that I'm here, you can head on out." He could guess what Thorn had been doing. They all had their habits. "Do something other than stand here all night."

"Yeah. Like paperwork." Thorn rolled his eyes, the movement exaggerated so his whole head went into the motion, as he gestured towards the stack sitting on one side of a control panel. "Just love signing my autographs."

"Di'kut," his brother beside him outstretched a hand and slapped the back of his helmet lightly in a playful manner. "Leave it, I'll see that it gets done. You're due to leave anyway."

"You sure? I can take it and—"

"Leave it, vod. I got it."

" . . . fine."

Thorn sighed, not fully wanting to drop the load on his brother, but they all did it. They all held the fort for one another. He clapped a hand down on Stone's shoulder, giving him a rough little shake, and knocked their helmets together. "The guard is now yours," he said. "Try not to burn the place down."

Stone groaned, throwing an arm up dramatically. "Look, the caff machine was one time, can't we let that go?"

Regardless, Stone gave his brother a nod, placing his own hand on Thorn's shoulder and gave it a brief squeeze. Letting him go, he let Thorn to step past him.

"Never," a chuckle escaped his throat as he swiped his nifty key card, and that officially took him off the clock. As the door slid open, thorn turned around to give his brother one final look.

"Be safe, vod."

"You know me, Thorn. Can't live without some trouble," Stone laughed, as he gently shook his head. Even so, he fully understood the sentiment; their jobs were usually anything but safe.

"Eh, yeah, yeah . . . " with an eye-roll accompanied by a wave of his hand, Thorn finally turned and left the control room, awfully glad to be free of his own 'prison'. However, rest wasn't on his to-do list for that night.

He still had another brother to check on.

**Author's Note:**

> If you haven't caught on, the Coruscant Guard are some of my favorite boys out of our clones, and with the lack of content for them, I decided to change that some! So here we just have two bros being bros, and another to check in with.


End file.
